Heartbeats
by a certain slant of light
Summary: Drabbles of the Kingdom Hearts series, written for challenges or just for fun! Multiple and many uncommon characters, pairings, and genres! Current drabble: RoxasKairi. ჯ het, slash, femslash. angst, humor, romance.
1. I: Naminé

**Author's Note**: Well, if you know me, you know I love to write drabbles. You also know I don't (usually) categorize drabbles (six hundred words or less) as stories of their own unless I really like them. But I enjoy sharing them with all my readers, so I often make anthologies of them. This is my fourth so far (other fandoms are Doctor Who, Final Fantasy, and Harry Potter) and it's Kingdom Hearts! These drabbles were most likely all written for different challenges, or just for fun and friends! That said, they are all standalone unless stated otherwise.

They are usually romance, humor, angst, or gen (or some combination) but may be other genres; pairings include het, slash, and femslash/femmeslash; ratings are from K to M (warnings will be posted for mature content); word count is usually one hundred to six hundred. Updates are random, but usually at least four days apart. Spoilers for all current Kingdom Hearts games (KHI, KH: CoM, and KHII) **–** any other spoilers will be marked accordingly. Of course, comments are appreciated and loved!

Some drabbles will be cross-posted here and in Flights of Fantasy (a Final Fantasy anthology of drabbles). This is not for hits or attention. This is because they are crossovers of each series (for example, Vaan/Yuffie, Vaan from Final Fantasy XII and Yuffie of FFVII but in her Kingdom Hearts incarnation). If anyone objects to this, please feel free to tell me and I'll choose whichever character (and by extension series) is dominant in the drabble and post it only in Flights of Fantasy or here. Otherwise, you'll see them both places.

If you would like a drabble to be longer (one-shot size), feel free to say so, but no guarantees.

Sorry for the long author's note (all other author's notes will just be in the drabble headers, and won't be nearly as lengthy)! Please enjoy!

**Disclaimer**: I do not own Kingdom Hearts, Final Fantasy, Disney, or any of the franchise characters, settings, or trademarks featured in these drabbles. This includes any sequels, prequels and threequels on any platform. This applies to all current and upcoming chapters.

* * *

**Title**: Instruments of Fate**  
Characters/Pairings**: Naminé  
**Author's Notes**: Written for challenge 142 at KH Drabble (on LJ): Destiny.

* * *

Naminé is the only one to ever touch Fate.

Others try. They stretch their wax wings and walk on skyscrapers and reach, reach, reach their stick-thin fingers to the sky. They tickle clouds and rain and try to fly, with the sun in their eyes and in their way. Their feathers melt, their breath catches in their throat, their fingers bubble with blackened flesh – and they fall, and they crash, and they burn.

But Naminé knows. If she could read or spell, she could write a book on it. You don't go to Fate – Fate comes to you. It is the breeze beneath your wings; it guides your fingers away from the sunspots and fire. She can feel its touch, delicate and invisible, against her skin. It is cool. It is patient. It speaks through her in a wordless whisper, in graphite poetry and watercolor prose.

And though it is like her own lace lullaby, Naminé hates it, would rather smolder in the sun as her flesh goes from white to tan to black than know that even to Fate, she is just another tool.


	2. I: Kairi

**Title**: The Art of Wading**  
Characters/Pairings**: Kairi  
**Author's Notes**: Written for challenge 142 at KH Drabble (on LJ): Destiny. The title is wordplay, homonym style!

* * *

It was there, and It was pulling. Much harder than it ever had before.

Whatever It was, It was everywhere. It was her looping cursive when she was bound in a classroom, learning names she wouldn't remember and trying to remember the one she couldn't. It was the heavy hug of her bookbag against her hip, bloated with knowledge and hungry for more, though she had no appetite. It was the sun pooling on her cheeks, the shadows dripping from her shoulders to the ground. It was the rank stench of sleep stuck to her tongue in the mornings, her matted hair, her eyes drowsy with dreams, her reflection in that silver plate of glass. It was the school skirt swishing about her legs; It was the tie tethered around her neck, choking the courage out of her. It was every mundane thing, every day she lived without living.

And the back of her mind was the only place It wasn't. There was found the watercolor portrait of a smiling boy with hair of messy brown, his likeness caged in glass and gloss, his name a worn-out engraving on a picture frame.

It knew who he was, and she'd find It if it meant finding him.

Today, It was the crisp curtain of water that embraced her as she fell in. It was gullsongs and salt and sun casting ribbons of warmth onto the ocean. It was her naked body, stripped of skirt and shirt and tie and socks and shoes and fear; her thick hair plastered to her shoulders above the surface, floating in a red halo below. Her open eyes, drinking in the sand beneath her suspended body. Her pearl pale flesh, water's lace light tattooing her arms and legs.

Yet as far she swam or as deep as she dove, It was always out of reach. But she was calm, patient, waiting; she could feel change in every vein and muscle, anchoring itself securely to her future.

It was coming. It was closer. Soon, It would be on the edge of Destiny.


	3. I: LarxeneAccessory Shop Girl

**Title**: Fine Things**  
Characters/Pairings**: Larxene, Jessie the Accessory Shop Girl (in Twilight Town) ; Larxene/Jessie  
**Author's Notes**: Written for my Twilight Town post at KH Request (on LJ), for **lorei**, with the prompt: fine things. She told me not to take it too seriously but I'm pretty sure I did. Haha. Also, no idea if Accessory Shop Girl's name is really Jessie. xD That's just what **lorei **put.

* * *

In the end, it's worth it. Everything is.

The clothes she wears. They hug every plane and hide every flaw, and sure, she looks good. But they're an assortment of blue and orange _and plenty of colors that are not black,_ and she hates them. Hates the feel of cotton softly kissing her skin where leather should be rubbing her raw.

Her hair worn loose. It falls into her eyes, an annoying brassy curtain. It tickles her neck and ghosts along her shoulders, and it rustles in the breeze. Soft like feathers against her tanning skin. It makes her feel so damn feminine she can't even look in a mirror.

The polite smile. Never a grin, predatory and cunning like she would have liked it – like she's grown accustomed to. But a _smile_. Only the top row of teeth, delicate. Something that can be compared to lilies and not white knives eager to shred. Pink lips parted in cheer that reaches her eyes without crinkling them, without making her look hungry, voracious like she is.

And by extension her laugh. So damn bubbly and polite and genuinely amused. Bursting softly from pearly lips and gently parting the air, without splitting it. Not animalistic, not sharp and slicing. Not a weapon. A gift. A generous display of emotions she's apparently very good at pretending to have.


	4. I: MarluxiaRoxas

**Title**: Homegrown Reality**  
Characters/Pairings**: Marluxia, Twilight Town Roxas ; Marluxia/Roxas  
**Author's Notes**: Written for my Twilight Town post at KH Request (on LJ), for **llama-sama**, with the prompt: "Break Me, Shake Me" by Savage Garden.

* * *

The boy's conscious of something a little deeper than reality. It's obvious to any perfect idiot. The way his eyes dart around, how they look _past_ the sunset everyone else is so busy looking _at_. How he laughs and smiles but is never happy, never comfortable, not really.

Marluxia knows why. He has to be with his own kind. The world doesn't welcome him like it does the others. It expects too much of him. Expects him to _feel_. That's his only crutch, and the world preys on it until he can't hear his friends' incessant chatter, just the thoughts making his brain crazy: _this isn't my home, I don't belong here, what's wrong with me…_

It's a shame, really. The world is breaking him before Marluxia has a chance to. That won't do. He demands to have some control over this subordinate, this Nobody, this boy. So he draws the realm closer to beauty, to show Roxas just how ugly he really is.

_You're not for this world._

There it is, but there it's not; the echo of a whisper fills the empty alleyway and mocks him.

_It was made for you, and yet it hates you._

A voice on the breeze, that stirs a dandelion peeking through cement, but falls into silence immediately after.

_Come with me._

Vines snake up a wall, twisting leaves that weep pink petals – Roxas swears that's never been there before.

_I'll make you a new one._

He jerks awake, and there at his windowsill is a chrysanthemum, wet with dew and deathly white, perfectly severed at the stem.

Finally Roxas can't take it anymore. The world is cracking, weeds hooking into it and bursting through the cracks. At the end of it all, there's only the voice, this time with a body. It drifts toward him from a coal black cloak, familiar, something right because it's just as wrong as he is. Something that doesn't fit in this world. Something to take him away.

"Who are you?"

The figure extends a hand, and beneath the shadowed veil Roxas knows he is smiling.

_Your world is waiting._


	5. I: AxelKairi

**Title**: Across the River**  
Characters/Pairings**: Axel, Kairi ; Axel/Kairi  
**Author's Notes**: Written for my Kairi post at KH Request (on LJ), for **syvia**, with the prompt: She had something of a temper. He liked that about her – and making it rise. That and: Mention of them having to dodge the rest of the Organization.

* * *

"Don't they ever wonder where you are?" Kairi sits on the gnarled bole of her favorite tree, braiding a crown of leaves. Axel prefers to stand, arms crossed, and look out at the horizon.

"Why should they? It's not like I'm breaking a rule."

"Isn't there someplace you should be?"

He chuckles. "You want me to leave?"

"No," she tells him, placing the crown aside and hopping down. "It just seems like they're the sort of people who would want to know where you disappear to."

Axel shrugs. Even though she stands face to face with him, his eyes stay on the burnt orange sea. "They don't miss me." Finally he looks at her, wearing a mask of amusement. "Why? Do you?"

Kairi sighs. "Sure, I wonder where you are. You get to see other worlds, right? Who wouldn't wonder about that?"

His eyebrows raise in a mirthy frown. "You sound like you want to come with me."

She doesn't blink. "Maybe I do."

Smirking, he leans off the soft bark and puts gloved fingers to her cheek. "You're not ready for another world. You can barely handle this one."

Affronted, she smacks his hand away. "I am! And if you won't take me, I'll find a way there myself!" Dry leaves crackle beneath her heavy footfalls as she stalks past him.

"Suit yourself," he calls to her, already summoning a whorl of darkness, "but Charon charges."


	6. I: SoraKairiRiku

**Title**: In Which Kairi Exercises a Vast Vocabulary**  
Characters/Pairings**: Kairi, Riku, Sora ; Sora/Kairi/Riku  
**Author's Notes**: Written for my Kairi post at KH Request (on LJ), for **pixie paramount**, with the prompt: namesakes.

* * *

"I don't want to be the princess this time!" Kairi complains, plucking a wreath of sticks and clumsily glued beads from her head.

"You have to be," Sora tells her, pretending to sharpen his wooden sword with a rock (except the rock's actually a very, very old pear, and Kairi and Riku are both far too amused to say anything). "You're the girl."

"That's sexism," she pouts, drawing both Riku's and Sora's gazes. Is that a word a nine-year-old girl should know?

"Is not," Sora finally says. "'Sides, you're always the princess."

"I _know_." Kairi looks pleadingly at Riku, who shrugs and continues searching the beach for a piece of driftwood big enough to use as a shield. "It's someone else's turn."

"Can't be me, I'm a boy."

"That's sexism too!" She marches over and places the tiara rather forcefully on his head; he tumbles backward onto the sand. Kairi snatches his sword up but leaves the pear alone. "I'm not being the princess! I'm the hero now!"

Riku, having located a sizeable chunk of bark, finally decides to join in. "She can be whatever she wants, Sora. It's not very hero-like to tell her she has to be something she doesn't want to."

Sora, cheeks red with embarrassment, rips off the tiara and tosses it at Riku. "Well, you be the princess then! You have long hair!"

"So?"

"You're girlier!"

"Sexism!" cries Kairi.

"I'm the guardian," Riku tells him matter-of-factly. "I can't be the princess. I need a princess to guard."

"You can't tell me what to be!" argues Sora. "You said so yourself!"

"No, I said it's not very hero-like. But I'm not a hero. I'm a guardian. Guardians are wise."

"Guardians are bossy," mumbles Kairi, swinging her sword around for practice.

"Fine!" Sora rises to his feet, rubbing sand off his knees. "Then I get to be the wizard! Wizards are so much wiser than guardians!"

"No fair!" The sword drops to Kairi's side. "Who am I supposed to rescue then? I can't rescue a wizard! That's dumb!"

Riku balances his shield on his head. "Maybe we should ask Selphie."

Sora appears not to have heard him. "Rescue Riku."

"Why?"

"He has girly hair!"

"Sexi-"

"IS NOT!"

Sora and Kairi begin bickering over long hair and dresses and make-up until the conversation devolves into "well your sword is stupid" and "well your crown is stupider!" Riku sighs and sits himself on a rock, shield lain across his knees and smiling. At heart, Sora will always be the hero, and Kairi will always be the princess. Riku hopes against hope and destiny and a mind too young to fully understand either concept that he will always be their guardian.


	7. I: SephirothKairi

**Title**: The Virtuous and the Wicked**  
Characters/Pairings**: Kairi, Sephiroth ; Sephiroth/Kairi  
**Author's Notes**: Written for my Kairi post at KH Request (on LJ), for **midnight-birth**, with the prompt: Her fear fed his addiction. She also asked for his sword to make an appearance, but I can never take Masamune seriously to begin with, and it would've just been silly. Also his wing, but I could only fit in... Well, you'll see.

* * *

"The world is terribly uninformative," he tells her, swiping his thumb along her cheek. Blood spreads from the shallow cut, smeared like watercolor over her tan skin. "If it weren't for your friends, you wouldn't be in this situation."

"Well, you'll have to keep moving down the line," she says, hatred burning in her blood – he can feel it on his fingers. "I'm not telling you anything."

"I'm losing patience." His voice is always without emotion, without rising or falling or pausing or passion. It makes her heart clutch at the cage of her ribs and scream. "It ends with you."

"It's never gonna start." The words come harder, crawling like cowards to the back of her throat farther and farther down. She forces them out, but they sound weak, like prisoners shoved into freedom, into a new world they no longer recognize.

"You're very quaint." He digs his nail into the scarlet strip and she whimpers despite herself. "That's better. Now that we're being honest, why don't you tell me where your friends are?"

"I don't know, and if I did –" He presses harder; her knees buckle under the weight of her pain and fear. Blood runs in ribbons over his fingers, following her pulse down her throat.

"Lying is a sin."

"I guess you would know," she whispers.

He chuckles lowly. "I speak only the truth. Honesty is why the world hates me."

"I can think of a few other reasons." The corner of his thin lips twitch; she thinks he might smirk. Instead, his nail rips down and she cries out, the skyline fading from red to silver to black –

Kairi snaps upright in bed, soaked in sweat and cold. Her blanket lies strewn on the floor, her window open, the ghost of wind slipping in and plastering night air to her damp skin. And there on the windowsill, strangely still in the breeze, lies a single black feather.

_Patience._


	8. I: Olette&Pence

**Title**: Differences of Opinion**  
Characters/Pairings**: Olette, Pence  
**Author's Notes**: Written for my Twilight Town post at KH Request (on LJ), for **baka-tenshi**, with the prompt: difference between girls and boys. I like to think this is set in the Virtual Twilight Town, on day two or three. Y'know, when Roxas is looking for Hayner, and he passes Olette and Pence, and Pence says they're shopping? Yeah. I'm lame like that. Also, I'm watching Hana Yori Dango and it's so hilarious. Except I'm not sure if the things I'm laughing at are actually meant to be funny. Teen soap operas rock.

* * *

"C'mon, Olette," Pence draws out the second syllable of each word, voice rising to a whine. "Hurry up!"

She folds her hands behind her back as they cross the square, steps bouncy, carefree, and completely oblivious to his plight. "These things take time."

"It's just a birthday present!" He closes the small distance that always slips between them when they've been walking too long. The ground begins to arch upwards under their feet as they step into the street leading to their usual spot, lined with shops.

"And it has to be special," she says. "Something Roxas won't forget." Before he has a chance to make a remark that will no doubt land him in the dog house (_Why don't you just give him a kiss, like we all know you want to? I'm pretty sure we'd all remember that!_) she asks, "What did you get him?"

He shrugs. "Nothing yet."

She rounds on him, quick as a flash, wearing that expression that always always _always_ makes him think of his aunt. "Pence! It's in two weeks!"

Pence sighs, rubbing the heels of his palms into his eyes. "Chill, Olette. That's, like, _forever_."

"That's, like, tomorrow!" An exasperated grumble grates his ears. "Why can't you ever think ahead?"

"Hey!" Well, now she was being silly _and_ unfair. "What about Hayner? He didn't get Roxas anything last year! He bought a dog made of popsicle sticks from the weapon shop guy's kid and told him he made it himself!"

"But he got him that new struggle bat for New Year!" she shoots back immediately. "Roxas loved that! And it cost Hayner enough for three birthday presents! What'd _you_ get Roxas for New Year?"

Pence's cheeks faded from red to pink; he turned his gaze to his feet. "A picture," he mumbled.

"A picture of what?" grilled Olette.

Pence said nothing.

"A picture of you two eating sea-salt ice cream that you took that same day and hadn't even looked at, and if you had you would have noticed Roxas's head wasn't even in it!" She stomped her foot, startling the passing mail boy. "So excuse me for being considerate and prepared, unlike some people!"

She spun on her heel and walked on. It took Pence a minute, as he was deciding whether or not to follow her, to catch up. By then she was at the top of the hill and he arrived, panting.

"So," he muttered sheepishly, "um… How's this shopping thing work?"


	9. I: RoxasRiku

**Title**: The End of the World**  
Characters/Pairings**: Riku, Roxas ; Riku/Roxas  
**Author's Notes**: Written for my trio (Roxas, Naminé, Axel) post at KH Request (on LJ), for **tresa-cho **with the prompt: angst-fest. I'm fairly certain is the angstiest angst to ever angst in Angst-town, North Angstalina, two-thousand-angst. If not, it's still pretty up there.

* * *

He still can't wash the failure off his skin. In some dark part of his mind (that's slowly sneaking to the front, right behind his eyes, like cigarette smoke snaking through cracks in the ceiling) he pretends it's just a bad spill, just wine that won't come out, won't come out, _wontcomeout!_

But in his mouth it doesn't taste like wine. Copper sticks to his tongue, the roof of his mouth, the back of his throat. No matter how many times he throws up, it won't go away. It tastes like the memory, like the slow, slow moment he could have done more but didn't.

_and he falls, and he doesn't get up, and the key is forever gone._

He can't scrub it off, can't cry it off, can't scream it off. It's plastered there, thick and so damn stubborn! After an hour, he doesn't even know whose blood it is anymore. His skin glows red in splotchy, raw spots where he was careless – and he was careless all over. But it doesn't matter now. If it's his, fine. It's better that way.

_and she runs, and she breathes into him, and then comes the hail of bullets like stars crashing down, making craters in their backs._

"You're only hurting yourself." There's no emotion in that voice, no concern, not even mild interest. It's spoken science: concise and calculating.

He doesn't speak. He scrubs a little harder and still can't understand why wine stains when champagne doesn't.

"Stop it." You're being a child.

_and he was a child, always a child, always needing someone to protect him, always running into things and never figuring he might not come out._

A little more red. Just a little more. Let it be the snowflake that caused the avalanche. Let it take it all away.

A sigh. Ripples dance in opposite directions. _No, the water is his. You can't be in it. It's_ his_._

Scarlet, crimson, red, red, red, red redredredred_redredred_–

Quickly enveloping black. Is this the smoke, finally choking the room? Or is this the night flooding through the open window as the toxins leak out?

* * *

The boy falls. Roxas drags his arm over his shoulder and spirits him away from him from his little hell.

_and he fell right there in the ripples, and was pulled ashore, in the hopes that maybe this one wouldn't have to know what it meant to feel heartless._


	10. I: Demyx&Larxene

**Title**: Burnt Sugar**  
Characters/Pairings**: Demyx, Larxene  
**Author's Notes**: Written for my Twilight Town post at KH Request (on LJ), for **baka-tenshi**, with the prompt: "turn off that noise." Mostly experimenting with Demyx (thus not entirely happy with it), and constructively exercising my profound dislike of that stupid little fairy.

* * *

Impossible. Getting anything done was _impossible._ How could he be expected to produce a decent tune with that damn racket? Demyx shut his eyes so tight he saw stars, hands poised and white-knuckled on the neck of his sitar.

Sa note.

Sa note.

_Sa_ –

And there was the squeal again, leaking from the walls. Exasperated, Demyx placed his sitar aside and left the room. The moment he stepped into Larxene's private playpen, he smelled it – like burnt sugar clogging his nostrils, squeezing greedily through the door. The noise was louder here, frustratingly high and discordant.

A smile split Larxene's face almost in half; her eyes looked like obsidian flecks in the shadow flooding her face. Smoke spiraled up in thin, wispy columns from the table.

"Would you keep it down?" Demyx called her attention away. She looked up from where she held the fairy's blackened wings beneath spindly fingers. It kicked wearily, toothpick legs swinging.

Her hand gave a spark; the little green thing cried again, like the string of a guitar snapping, and its legs fell flat on the table. "Keep what down?"

"Your… toy! I can't do _anything_ with that noise!"

Larxene clucked her tongue. "Then change rooms."

"Can't," he told her, steady as he could. He didn't have emotions, but he had nerves, and she never failed to get on every last one of them. "Acoustics are best in that one. You change."

She sighed, her fingers crackling again. The fairy wept a bit louder, the pitch incessant; Demyx felt a headache clawing at the back of his eyes. It was one thing to kill, quite another to disturb. "When I've put all this effort into making her comfortable here? You're so rude, Demyx."

"I don't care what you do," he said. "Just be quiet."

Her mocking pout disappeared, wolf-grin sharpening her face again. Something fizzed to life in her eyes, and it was clear she was no longer looking at him so much as through him. In one of her phases. Demyx glared at her a bit, turned, and opened the door. The air was too sweet here – it made him feel full, choked.

"Hear that, Tink?" Larxene's voice snaked through the smoke. "Demyx wants you to be quiet. I think we can arrange that."

He closed the door behind him, waited… heard only the briefest striking pop of lightning, then sweet, sweet silence.


	11. I: MarluxiaRoxasAxel

**Title**: Petite Mort**  
Characters/Pairings**: Axel, Marluxia, Roxas; Marluxia/Roxas/Axel  
**Author's Notes**: Written for my trio post at KH Request (on LJ), for **llama-sama**, with the prompt: "Merciless Cult" by Dir en Grey. Went with the line _the pessimistic you / the merciless you / and the self-loving you _because it described all of them together, while all of them separately. Awesome. Playing around with second person perspective. Implicit adult themes!

* * *

In the dark, the real dark, the dark outside your hollow ribs, it's different. It's clotting and woven thick. And you can't see a thing, though your eyes may strain and narrow and water with the effort. After a while, you wonder if they're even open.

Up and down becomes relative. Gravity pulls you one way, euphoria another. You can tell which direction you're facing only from the smell of burning linen, of the press of hot fingertips and the silent sizzle of your skin. Down is hellfire, is lips tracing a path along your bubbling black flesh – or is it the chariot, drawing the sun there? Which came first?

There is no empty space or sky. The ceiling is the boughs of trees, arcing overhead and bracing together to squeeze out the daylight. Vines tangle down around your neck, around your wrists. Smooth, cool, slick with dew. Thorns sprout from them, growing slowly in some places, jumping forward and serrating in others. Blood trickles down, little steaming rivers where hell has burned too hot.

Down is merciless, bursting like sap in a fire. Up is loving, so loving, but not of you – never of you. And you really can't choose one over the other, because they're both just as bad.

Just as bad.


	12. I: Xigbar&Roxas

**Title**: Too Much Information**  
Characters/Pairings**: Roxas, Xigbar  
**Author's Notes**: Written for my trio post at KH Request (on LJ), for **thisisthesmile**, with the prompt: Xigbar teaches Roxas something. (Not necessarily Xigbar being Roxas' teacher, but you know.) Also: mention of Roxas and Axel as best friends, nothing more.

* * *

"This is how you tell the difference."

"I don't want to tell the difference," Roxas says flatly. Times like these he wishes he had a book (to actually read, unlike Larxene, who mostly busies herself with the pictures), just so he could hold it in front of his face and ignore people. Glancing in the opposite direction and speaking in monotone usually works, but not with Xigbar. The guy can't be drowned out, and he never gives up.

"C'mon," he slings an arm over Roxas's shoulder; Roxas bristles and stares more intently at the far wall, face turned away from the pest, "this is something every dude's gotta know. I'm doing you a service here."

"No. Thank you."

For some reason, Xigbar laughs. Roxas hates it when he laughs, like he's discovered some secret to making his amusement sound real. "Can't pull the wool over my eyes – eye. You wanna know."

"I do not."

"Sure you do!" Xigbar removes his arm and pats Roxas on the back. Hard. Roxas barely resists the urge to summon his keyblades, and distantly hopes Larxene will walk by with her book and give Xigbar a good beating. "So, here's how you know if a chick is faking it. First off, there's this really –"

"I don't want to know."

"Why wouldn't you –" There's a long pause, which Roxas revels in because silence comes so rarely when Xigbar's around. Then comes a very drawn out, very breathy "ooooh" like he's realized something extremely profound. Finally he says, "I gotcha. So you're into dudes, huh?"

Roxas tells himself it's not possible to feel embarrassment, humiliation, not possible to feel anything – despite the tomato color his cheeks are turning. "Excuse me?"

"Hey, man, that's cool, that's cool." Xigbar holds up his hands in mock arrest. "Live and let love. I'm good with it. I mean, we're friends right? That's what friends –"

"We're not friends."

Xigbar frowns. "Dude… You know I'm flattered, but how do you think I know this stuff? Experience. We may not be playing against each other, but we're sure as hell not batting for the same team."

Not possible to feel anger either, but Roxas's fists clench, teeth ground so tight he can't squeeze a word out.

Meanwhile, Xigbar casually goes on. "And anyway, that's probably unhealthy. I always assumed you and Axel were just friends, with how much you two hang out. But now… I like the guy, y'know? Can't go gettin' nookie from his boyfriend."

Roxas feels his hands tingle and finally turns his glare on Xigbar.

Xigbar blinks. "What?"

"Organization XIII is about to become Organization XII."


	13. I: XemnasAxel

**Title**: Fire**  
Characters/Pairings**: Axel, Xemnas ; Xemnas/Axel  
**Author's Notes**: Written for my trio post at KH Request (on LJ), for **Digimon Empress Yaten**, with the prompt: fire can be a beautiful thing.

* * *

He is the first. As such, when another complains of being heartless, he feels no dark humor or annoyance. He truly feels nothing. In every empty cavity of his body there lurks only darkness, only a void unfulfilled.

It is not amusing to watch the others be ignorant of their gifts. Little traces of emotion they ignore or take for granted. They can't feel it. They can't see it. Yet there it is. Anger. Greed. Despair. The scientist in him is smiling; the Nobody of him is placid, yet intrigued.

None of them is a better example than Number Eight. Sly little smirks when he's wrapped up in a scheme he thinks is all his own. Entertainment at the futility of it all: his eyebrows raised, frowning slightly. Fury burning across his cheeks and ears; annoyance in the twitch of his fingers; relief in the subtle relaxed slump of his sharp shoulders.

Interesting. A little bit marvelous, maybe. Never surprising. After all, fire is energy, is fuel, is that which gives life and that which ends it. And Xemnas is not jealous, not ever jealous, does not feel that little nagging creature in the back of his brain that tells him fire is so very like a heartbeat.


	14. I: HaynerSelphie

**Title**: Night Without Twilight**  
Characters/Pairings**: Hayner, Selphie ; Hayner/Selphie  
**Author's Notes**: Written for my Final Fantasy character post at KH Request (on LJ), for **baka-tenshi**, with the prompt: jump rope.

* * *

He remembers, when he was very young, a girl. A girl with brown hair that, when it caught the twilight just right, flashed cinnamon. A girl with sap-green eyes and scabs on her knees from tree climbing in the dark. Someone with a lyrical voice that taunted him and egged him on, but dipped with concern when he scraped his elbow or found himself on the receiving end of Seifer's fist. She's just a colorful blur in the back of his mind, but he remembers her.

Just like he remembers the day there was no sunset, or sunrise, but night lasted a very long time, and a white pillar split the shoreline. They'd been jumping rope on Sunset Terrace, too young to be afraid of a sky that wouldn't lighten, to think their parents might be concerned. The whole world was a pretty black sky and a thin plastic rope swinging in swift circles.

Together, they watched the light sever the sky over their heads. Twilight Town yawned apart, and space stared back. Beyond the stars were floating orbs of every color, some like sea-salt ice cream, some like blinking stoplights. Their mouths stretched open and in the wonder he remembers her skin reflected pale pink, her eyes wide and hungry for whatever lay outside. And he remembers dread, and holding onto her hand. _No planet but this one._

There was a rumble that built to a quake, erupting into a scream that rose forth from the earth beneath their feet. The word flashed white – and then nothing. A sunset, as everlasting as before, and a frightened boy with an empty hand.

Yes, he remembers. A brave little girl in a honey-yellow dress, staring into space without fear. Some days, he'll look down at his palm, much bigger now, and think how eventually he'll find a way. Maybe she's on the sea-salt one, or the stoplight one, or some planet miles away he couldn't see. It doesn't matter. He'll keep looking, until she's not just a memory.

* * *

On a sun-kissed island, she sits and watches day slip into the sea, painting the sky orange. Something nibbles at the back of her mind – a glimpse of blond hair, amber eyes, short temper. The sun's crown disappears beneath the water. Her heart tells her to remember, remember.

She doesn't.

**Title**: Night Without Twilight**  
Characters/Pairings**: Hayner, Selphie ; Hayner/Selphie  
**Author's Notes**: Written for my Final Fantasy character post at KH Request (on LJ), for **baka-tenshi**, with the prompt: jump rope.

* * *

He remembers, when he was very young, a girl. A girl with brown hair that, when it caught the twilight just right, flashed cinnamon. A girl with sap-green eyes and scabs on her knees from tree climbing in the dark. Someone with a lyrical voice that taunted him and egged him on, but dipped with concern when he scraped his elbow or found himself on the receiving end of Seifer's fist. She's just a colorful blur in the back of his mind, but he remembers her.

Just like he remembers the day there was no sunset, or sunrise, but night lasted a very long time, and a white pillar split the shoreline. They'd been jumping rope on Sunset Terrace, too young to be afraid of a sky that wouldn't lighten, to think their parents might be concerned. The whole world was a pretty black sky and a thin plastic rope swinging in swift circles.

Together, they watched the light sever the sky over their heads. Twilight Town yawned apart, and space stared back. Beyond the stars were floating orbs of every color, some like sea-salt ice cream, some like blinking stoplights. Their mouths stretched open and in the wonder he remembers her skin reflected pale pink, her eyes wide and hungry for whatever lay outside. And he remembers dread, and holding onto her hand. _No planet but this one._

There was a rumble that built to a quake, erupting into a scream that rose forth from the earth beneath their feet. The word flashed white – and then nothing. A sunset, as everlasting as before, and a frightened boy with an empty hand.

Yes, he remembers. A brave little girl in a honey-yellow dress, staring into space without fear. Some days, he'll look down at his palm, much bigger now, and think how eventually he'll find a way. Maybe she's on the sea-salt one, or the stoplight one, or some planet miles away he couldn't see. It doesn't matter. He'll keep looking, until she's not just a memory.

* * *

On a sun-kissed island, she sits and watches day slip into the sea, painting the sky orange. Something nibbles at the back of her mind – a glimpse of blond hair, amber eyes, short temper. The sun's crown disappears beneath the water. Her heart tells her to remember, remember.

She doesn't.


	15. I: Cloud&Stitch

**Title**: Good Intentions**  
Characters/Pairings**: Cloud, Stitch  
**Author's Notes**: Written for my Final Fantasy character post at KH Request (on LJ), for **fox-the-kitsune**, with the prompt: curiosity.

* * *

It took Experiment #626 long enough to finally decide Sora's hair was not an entity upon itself, or a strange parasite anchored to the boy's head, but in fact a natural arrangement of hair common to most humans.

Unfortunately, in the case of Cloud Strife, it took Stitch twice as long.

But it looked _threatening._ Spikes jutting out every which way, like the spines of a sea creature he and Lilo might see back home. Stitch performed multiple experiments to assess whether they contained poisonous barbs or released a noxious gas when disturbed. No matter how many times poked and prodded, however, Stitch emerged unscathed. The poor human to which the creature had attached itself, however, grew visibly more frustrated.

And really, that was unfair. After all, Stitch was conducting research. Research that, in the end, would only benefit Disgruntled Homo Sapiens #92-B. It didn't appear the creature posed any sort of physical threat, but perhaps its tranquility belied its true intent. Though #92-B might've be unaware of it, the creature could be slowly leeching his life force through hidden tentacles it used to secure itself to the human's scalp. Stitch approached this problem from multiple angles, even trying to scrape the thing off with a putty knife – much the same way he and Lilo had been forced to remove gum from desks after one of their more bubbly misadventures. But #92-B only crassly misunderstood Stitch's good intentions and threw him off.

Strange how Stitch was always thwarted by that he was trying to save. Then it hit him.

_Mind control._

The creature must have hooked itself into #92-B's brain and somehow transformed him into a personal defense system. _Brilliant._ There was no question anymore: this was significantly reminiscent of Stitch's cousin, Experiment #302, a like-minded brainwashing organism. And what did one use against #302 and those like it? Simple: vinegar.

So Stitch, in a valiant last ditch effort to salvage what remained of #92-B's shriveled brain, doused the creature in as much vinegar as he could find. But its hooks were stronger than Stitch had anticipated – perhaps it was a hybrid of #302, adapted to its only weakness – and sent its personal defense system, the long gone #92-B, raging after him with bloodthirsty intent.

It was all Stitch could do to hide under the dress of #92-B's mate and hope Sora would show up to help him conquer this new evil. As such, he only heard the conversation outside pink and white lace as he clutched her leg.

"Aerith, have you seen a little blue –"

"Are you covered in vinegar?"

A very long pause. "Yes. Now have you –"

Some very soft, very amused chuckling. "Cloud, I think you and Stitch need to sit down and have a talk."

"Stitch?"

"Yes. And you might want to wear a hat until it's over."


	16. I: MarluxiaYuffie

**Title**: Honeysuckles**  
Characters/Pairings**: Marluxia, Yuffie ; Marluxia/Yuffie  
**Author's Notes**: Written for my Final Fantasy character post at KH Request (on LJ), for **tart-of-war**, with the prompt: boys over flowers.

* * *

Perhaps she's new to these types of parties. That's what Marluxia assumes as he watches the black-haired girl flit from table to table. She never stays very long, never seems accepted into any pinwheel of conversation. Not surprising. She is a stranger here: the girls don't take well to strangers, and the guys are too busy impressing the girls (or trying to). So the little black butterfly just sips lightly at her drink, fluttering in and out of the incandescent beams of light.

He'd remember her. Just like he remembers Naminé, the quiet little freshman in his TA Art class. They're a bit the same: alien, submersed in new surroundings. But where Naminé is white, this girl is black. Black hair, black shorts, grey top. And she seems less shut-in than Naminé, less wary – and obviously much more willing to jump into any conversation, though it's proven in the past she'll only be promptly dumped out of it.

Marluxia commits her to memory, bit by bit. He can only catch glimpses of her; after all, he has a reputation, he has friends, _he's_ not the stranger. It's a little preoccupying being surrounded by a gaggle of gossipy girls, slurring their hollow compliments. They're all too aware of how drunk they are – how _easy_, and how they suppose he somehow finds that appealing. But where's the fun without a challenge?

_She_, however, is beyond amusing. This is definitely her first party. She turns her back a little too long, drink tantalizingly unattended on the table behind her. A few minutes later, she's already shouldering the wall in an effort to stay upright.

Larxene, all the while, wears a suspiciously self-satisfied smirk. "Stupid girl."

"Something you know I don't?" asks Marluxia, entertained. Black butterfly slumps a little lower, cup precariously tipped in her hand.

"Angels don't belong in a hellhole." She grins, eyes flashing wild. The girl sinks to her knees, not giggling like all the other people in the room experiencing some lack of equilibrium. "They misplace their little wings and can't get out."

"Only because demons like you fancy feathers in their decorating." She laughs. He doesn't. "Tacky."

* * *

It's a pretty boring party, really. Everyone seems knit into their own groups, and each one's talking about something different, but none of them are talking about anything interesting. _Shoes_ and _tennis_ and _keggers_. Parties with neon lights are supposed to be fun, like in the movies, where the plot reaches a climax and the guy falls head-over-heels in love with the girl – even if she does throw up on his shoes a bit. Not terribly romanticized, but _interesting_.

Movies are never like real life, Yuffie thinks ruefully. Scratch the idea of being an actress.

And while the conversation sucks, at least the scenery's okay. By that she means the guy in the corner who keeps glancing her way, like she doesn't notice. Of course she recognizes him: layered brown hair, aquiline jaw, eyes the color of berries. She may be new to the school, but she knows, because that's just who he _is_. The guy everyone knows. The guy who throws the parties in the big house with the blue and pink lights.

She doesn't know his name. Doesn't know anyone's, actually. Which was sort of the whole point of coming. A party? What better way to make friends? But turns out the girls here are just like the girls in her homeroom: ignorant and kind of rude. And the guys are too busy trying to have sex to care about becoming friends without benefits.

Still, she won't leave. Leaving's like giving up. And _he's_ noticing her. Maybe he'll come and introduce himself. Yuffie'd do the same, but he's surrounded on all sides by people, and a very intimidating blond girl. She doesn't like being intimidated: it's an unfamiliar feeling. Still, when Yuffie catches her eye, the girl's got a smile like a shark. And no need to start something when she's barely started school.

_At least wait a semester before getting kicked out this time._

Definitely not her usual surroundings, but after a while things get a bit better. Maybe it's the smoke, or maybe she's looked at the lights too long, but everything starts to blur together. Even the redundant chatter becomes a nice little hum, and the wall is so cool against her skin, and the floor is so inviting. But, then…

"Oh, crap," she mutters, slumping to her knees, eyelids drooping heavily. Why would someone drug her anyway? Unless it wasn't meant for her. Oh, _crap_. Nothing more embarrassing than getting roofied _by accident_. Well, maybe she saved some other girl from it. That is kind of comforting. As is the notion that once she wakes up, she'll have an actual reason to kick someone's ass.

The carpet is warm under her bare arms, and she stares up at the ceiling, trying to piece together thoughts. _Gonna… kill… someone…_ The orange lighting is playing off the shadows, swaying as if to the music. Pretty. But the music's slowing down, and she feels tired. The room gets a little bit darker, the chatter a little bit duller, her eyelids a little bit heavier. And the last thing she'll remember will be a figure obscuring her view, the feeling of flying, and the scent of honeysuckles.


	17. I: RoxasKairi

**Title**: Sanitarium**  
Characters/Pairings**: Kairi, Roxas ; Roxas/Kairi  
**Author's Notes**: Written for my alternate universe post at KH Request (on LJ), for **dreamer1789**, with the prompt: alternate game ending AU. There's some slight Roxas/Naminé in there too. **Resubmitting this chapter because I deleted a story and placed it as chapter nine: Roxas/Riku.**

* * *

There is no moonlight visible through the ivory bars. The too-white room provides its own eerie light in the dark, shapes rising up in sickly greys like ghosts. Moments like this make him hate his blonde hair, so pale in the dark, just like everything else. But he loves her red, shocking against the white pillowcase, the white bed, the white floor, walls, room. It's not like blood. It's like a heart.

He can hear hers, very faintly echoing throughout the empty cavity of their prison. It sings mournfully through her marble flesh, through the softly-woven white cotton of her dress. The blood rushes through her body, pooling and illuminating the scars on her chest that he traces with his finger. She doesn't stir like she used to all those nights ago. (That's the way things are measured now. Not days, not months, not years. Just night after night after night, where nothing gets darker, but everything gets lighter.) Kairi simply doesn't feel as much anymore.

"One day," he tells her, words whispered into the shell of her ear; she shifts slightly in her sleep, "I'll get you out of here. Both of us. Her too."

He will. He can't dream, but he can see it just as well awake. They'll go to the place she used to talk about, but no longer does. Destiny Islands. Where everything is orange and green, not white. Where he can meet her best friend Selphie. Where they can carve headstones themselves and properly honor the memories of Sora and Riku. Where they can get a bit stronger, and come back when the nightmare's over.

Where they don't spend night after night after night in a room the color of a casket. Where she won't be taken away for hours on end, returning in bandages spotted with a red so very different from her hair. Where Naminé can look on peacefully, like she wants to, without being wrenched from someone else's heart. Where none of them are Xemnas's experiments and tools.

There's no gust of cool air (no breeze at all, only stagnancy), but Kairi curls onto her side and digs her fingers into the fabric of his pajamas. Roxas is sure she's still asleep when she mutters "thank you" against the cotton. But he's not certain whose voice it is: a girl who grew up on an island faraway, or one who flitted from mansion to mansion until she found a home in someone's heart.

They'll get away, he swears. One day. Before one voice is ripped into two.


End file.
